


Cold

by honey_and_milk



Category: Robin of Sherwood
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-12
Updated: 2014-05-12
Packaged: 2018-01-24 10:54:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1602626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honey_and_milk/pseuds/honey_and_milk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A brief exploration of that year without Robin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cold

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://avictoriangirl.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://avictoriangirl.livejournal.com/)**avictoriangirl** for the prompt "Cold" and the characters Robert of Huntingdon and Nasir. Unbetaed. Oops. Please point out any glaring typos.

When Robin died, Nasir had known that it was the beginning of the end. The rest of them, Marion, Much, Will, Little John and Tuck hadn’t realized it, not until the arguments started becoming more and more frequent, not until Marion left the forest at her father’s request and with King John’s blessing, not until Will and John had come to blows. But soon enough, they all knew what Nasir had known from the start. Their life in Sherwood was over. Without Robin to guide them, they were lost, an outlaw band like any other in the forest, as quarrelsome as any pack of wolves without an alpha.

Will had been the first the first to leave after Marion, angry and ashamed after he had broken John’s nose and hit Much when the boy had tried to stop his friends from fighting. He had muttered a quiet apology, stayed up all night, and left first thing in the morning before Much awoke and he had to see the broken-hearted expression on his face. John and Much had stayed on longer, trying to make it work, but they left too, John playing the brother in Robin’s absence, wanting the best he could offer for Much, wanting him to have more than a renegade’s life in Sherwood.

Too soon, the only outlaws left were the Saracen and the Priest. They survived together, for some time, though they no longer pretended that they would carry on the legacy of Robin Hood. They hunted, sparred, and ate together, often discussing the differences in their respective faiths with a camaraderie that they had not had when the others had been with them. But as the days wore on, Nasir began to realize that he could not stay, could not simply exist in Sherwood, living only to live until the next day, lacking a purpose, being reminded everywhere he looked of the friends that he had lost, the only friends he had had at all in this strange land. And so, one day when the leaves were first changing colour, he said his goodbyes to Tuck, and left.

Nasir had forgotten how cold England was. He had felt it when he had first come, and for the duration of his years under Belleme’s power, but somehow, the cold had not mattered in Sherwood. Somehow, the rains that would soak them and chill the world around them had not meant anything there. It was as though the band of outlaws and their loyalty and friendship had provided more warmth than the sun could ever hope to imitate. But as he left the forest that had been his home for two years - no, before he had left - the cold had begun to settle in again, chilling him to his very core, sometimes forcing him to awaken in the small hours of the morning, shivering and pulling his fur blanket closer around himself.

The cold had been almost enough to make him consider returning to the land that had been his home before, but he knew he could not. He had cut his ties with his life there on the day, the very same day, that his life in Sherwood had begun to crumble. And so he had gone West, at first by foot, and later on horseback, having earned enough from small commissions along the way that he could afford one. West, to the ends of the Earth, for if he could not find purpose there, where could he possibly find it?

Purpose, it seemed, found him almost a year after Robin’s death, at the border of Wales. Nasir had come across the small army by chance, but the familiarity of the men at the head had encouraged him to follow, to watch and wait. Gisburne, rode alongside Marion’s father. It was a partnership that rang untrue to Nasir, that twisted something in his gut, telling him that something was wrong, terribly wrong. He was unsurprised when Gisburne and his men fled at the arrival of the enemy forces; Gisburne was hardly noble, and Nasir was certain that he loathed Marion’s father nearly as much as he loathed Marion herself. When Marion’s father, despite the loss of his army, still rushed into the battle that he could only lose, Nasir hesitated. The man had been a crusader, an invader and an enemy of his people. He wondered what atrocities Richard of Leaford had committed in the Holy Land in the name of God and Country. He wondered if the man realized what he had done to Marion, to all of them, when he had bought her pardon. He thought of Marion then, of Robin and what Robin would have done, and was ashamed of himself, realizing how lost he had become without Robin and his friends, how disturbingly cold-hearted. He rushed into the fray, knowing that he himself could not prevail, but with the wild hope that he could save the father of one of his dearest friends.

When he was captured, he was sure he would live out the rest of his life in the horrid realm of Owen of Clun, fighting like a trained dog for the entertainment of madmen. His brief elation at seeing his dear friend Marion was shattered with the realization that she would likely die here too, even if he plotted their escape with his every waking moment and prayed to Allah for their safe release and return home (wherever ‘home’ was) with his every breath. He would try, try for Marion’s sake and for his own, but he was only one man and he knew his best efforts would not be enough. He had never missed his fellow outlaws, his dear friend Robin, more than he had when he saw Marion and realized that his fate was not the only one that depended on his ability to escape the wretched place.

And when he had seen Marion, bespelled and unable to look away from Owen, Nasir had feared the worst, feared that there was no hope left for him to grasp at. But Allah was kind, far kinder than Nasir had given him credit for.

When the blond man, little more than a boy, had appeared at the arena demanding a chance to win Marion from the lunatic Clun, he had been curious. Nasir would have laid down his life to save Marion her fate if he had thought for an instant that Clun would have given her up to the boy with the kind eyes. But Clun would not, he knew, and so he also knew that if he died, there would be no one left to protect Marion at all. He had to kill the boy, though he would take no pleasure in the act. When the blond tried to pull the mask from his face, Nasir granted him the privilege. The least the boy deserved was to see the face of the man who would kill him.  
It was not long, however, before Nasir discovered that his fate was not to kill the boy after all, his heart nearly leaping from his chest with elation when he saw his old friends Will and John, realized that they were working together once more, were working with the boy he held at knifepoint. It had been enough then, Marion could be saved, he could be saved. He had been wary during the rescue, not wanting to allow himself to think, to hope, that this one escapade meant that they could return to what they had been, that he could return to his home in Sherwood.

The boy, Robert, _Robin,_ called himself the son of Herne. Just as Robin, the first Robin, had. Nasir knew it wouldn’t be the same, that they could never truly reclaim all they had lost. Robert didn’t burn white hot like Robin of Loxley had, but he shone all the same. He shone with his smiles, all bright teeth and sparkling eyes. And when Robert turned that brilliant grin towards Nasir, Nasir knew, as he had known that his life in Sherwood had ended with the death of Robin, that that same life had been reborn with the arrival of Robert. Nasir returned the smile, and England didn’t feel quite so cold.  



End file.
